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[Awesome!] Unprecedentedly Clear Imagery Of Massive Explosions On The Sun Growing And Erupting

by ForumGuru Banned
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This incredible imagery was compiled by NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory and was created from over 2,600 terabytes of data. That's more than one image a second since 2010!

This video is incredible and it gets really amazing at about the 1:15 mark...


February 11, 2015 marks five years in space for NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory, which provides incredibly detailed images of the whole sun 24 hours a day. Capturing an image more than once per second, SDO has provided an unprecedentedly clear picture of how massive explosions on the sun grow and erupt ever since its launch on Feb. 11, 2010. The imagery is also captivating, allowing one to watch the constant ballet of solar material through the sun's atmosphere, the corona.

In honor of SDO's fifth anniversary, NASA has released a video showcasing highlights from the last five years of sun watching. Watch the movie to see giant clouds of solar material hurled out into space, the dance of giant loops hovering in the corona, and huge sunspots growing and shrinking on the sun's surface.

The imagery is an example of the kind of data that SDO provides to scientists. By watching the sun in different wavelengths - and therefore different temperatures - scientists can watch how material courses through the corona, which holds clues to what causes eruptions on the sun, what heats the sun's atmosphere up to 1,000 times hotter than its surface, and why the sun's magnetic fields are constantly on the move.

Five years into its mission, SDO continues to send back tantalizing imagery to incite scientists' curiosity. For example, in late 2014, SDO captured imagery of the largest sun spots seen since 1995 as well as a torrent of intense solar flares. Solar flares are bursts of light, energy and X-rays. They can occur by themselves or can be accompanied by what's called a coronal mass ejection, or CME, in which a giant cloud of solar material erupts off the sun, achieves escape velocity and heads off into space. In this case, the sun produced only flares and no CMEs, which, while not unheard of, is somewhat unusual for flares of that size. Scientists are looking at that data now to see if they can determine what circumstances might have led to flares eruptions alone.

Goddard built, operates and manages the SDO spacecraft for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington, D.C. SDO is the first mission of NASA's Living with a Star Program. The program's goal is to develop the scientific understanding necessary to address those aspects of the sun-Earth system that directly affect our lives and society.
Cheers

-don
  • Profile picture of the author MissTerraK
    That was fantastic footage and a completely mind blowing view.

    It's one thing to hear it explained and illustrated on paper and quite another to see the actual thing.

    Wow!


    Terra
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  • Profile picture of the author Joshua Rigley
    Banned
    What amazing footage, and a very fitting soundtrack as well. Makes you really appreciate the beauty of our sun.
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  • Profile picture of the author ForumGuru
    Banned
    Agreed, the soundtrack is quite fitting! They did a great job putting that video together.

    Cheers

    -don
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  • Profile picture of the author onSubie
    I like how someone shouted "God" in a crowded Science channel ....
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  • Profile picture of the author HeySal
    You do know that any of us can help with spotting sun storms? If this kind of stuff cranks you - you should sign up at http://www.solarstormwatch.com/ You will get feeds sent from satellites to look over and you report anomolies on the feeds back to them. This particular video in the OP might just have been put together from frames that people just like you and I reported. So if you're an armchair solar scientist wanna-be -- this might be a real kick for ya.

    Shane -- here's one just for you. HiRise - HiWish: Public Suggestion Page You can help HiRISE decide what places on Mars we'll photograph next! To suggest a new target, first create an account using this web site. When you have completed registration, login and begin creating new suggestions. You can also browse the targets already in our database, including those for past HiRISE images.

    There are a lot of astronomy projects online that use volunteers. You want to look for planets or radio signal signs of intelligent life elsewhere or a bunch of other types of tasks -- Her's a page with about 10 projects on it. Some only require a computer - some need more, but there's interactive projects for anyone who wants to get involved in science, but has no real science background:
    List of Citizen-Science Projects - Sky & Telescope
    Signature

    Sal
    When the Roads and Paths end, learn to guide yourself through the wilderness
    Beyond the Path

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    • Profile picture of the author ForumGuru
      Banned
      Originally Posted by HeySal View Post

      You will get feeds sent from satellites to look over and you report anomolies on the feeds back to them. This particular video in the OP might just have been put together from frames that people just like you and I reported.
      All of that imagery came from the SDO spacecraft launched 5 years ago. This was the 5 year "highlight reel" and nothing but SDO has delivered imagery quite like this. SDO is the cadillac of solar observation sats....



      SDO is a sun-pointing semi-autonomous spacecraft that will allow nearly continuous observations of the Sun with a continuous science data downlink rate of 130 Megabits per second (Mbps). The spacecraft is 4.5 meters high and over 2 meters on each side, weighing a total of 3100 kg (fuel included). SDO's inclined geosynchronous orbit was chosen to allow continuous observations of the Sun and enable its exceptionally high data rate through the use of a single dedicated ground station.
      The following image illustrates the resolution capabilities of the SDO, STEREO, and SOHO spacecrafts. SDO's AIA instrument (right image) has twice the image resolution than STEREO (middle image) and 4 times greater imaging resolution than SOHO (left image). The image cadence also varies. SDO takes 1 image every second. At best STEREO takes 1 image every 3 minutes and SOHO takes 1 image every 12 minutes.


      This baby takes a ton of different images at different wavelengths and sends down an incredible 130M Mbps of data on a continuous basis. That's like downloading 1.5 million songs daily!



      The Atmospheric Imaging Assembly images the solar atmosphere in multiple wavelengths to link changes in the surface to interior changes. Data includes images of the Sun in 10 wavelengths every 10 seconds.
      The Science Teams receive the data from SDO, and then they process, analyze, archive, and serve the data. A lot of data...

      ○ Measure the extreme ultraviolet spectral irradiance of the Sun at a rapid cadence
      ○ Measure the Doppler shifts due to oscillation velocities over the entire visible disk
      ○ Make high-resolution measurements of the longitudinal and vector magnetic field over the entire visible disk
      ○ Make images of the chromosphere and inner corona at several temperatures at a rapid cadence
      ○Make those measurements over a significant portion of a solar cycle to capture the solar variations that may exist in different time periods of a solar cycle
      SDO delivers unprecedented resolution, speed, and data...

      Although SDO is taking similar images to some of its predecessors, SDO is unlike any other satellite. SDO will be taking A LOT of extremely large photos, of the whole Sun, in extremely short periods of time. Our principle is, the more details and the more information you have, the better big picture understanding you can build.

      But what exactly do we mean? Let’s just take the instruments that photograph the atmosphere of the Sun. EIT on SOHO takes a fairly small (1,000,000 pixels) full-sun image every 10 minutes. AIA on SDO will take 4 large (16,000,000 pixels) full-sun image every 10 seconds. Another way to think about it is to say that SOHO is like a 1 megapixel camera while SDO is like a 16 megapixel camera. No matter which way you look at it, it’s a lot of pixels! OK, so it will produce a lot of data, but what else makes it special?

      Many satellites share a ground system (place on the ground where they send data and photographs) and have recording systems to save the data collected until they can talk to their ground station. Because SDO has no recording system and will be collecting so much data (1.5 terabytes of data daily… that’s like downloading half a million songs a day!), the SDO mission had to build its very OWN ground station out in the desert of
      New Mexico. For this to be possible, SDO has to be placed in a geosynchronous orbit (GEO). This means that it will rotate at the same speed as the Earth and will always be directly above and in constant communication with its ground station in New Mexico.
      Mission

      SDO | Solar Dynamics Observatory

      http://lunar.gsfc.nasa.gov/newslette...b-March-09.pdf

      I believe this page shows the closest to real time images you can get.

      SDO | Solar Dynamics Observatory Data

      Cheers

      -don
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  • Profile picture of the author HeySal
    Don - STEREO is the system that the Solar Stormwatch uses for the project I listed that any of us can sign up for. What they do is give each "watcher" small sections, up-close resolutions, of the sun - not the whole thing. So you are watching just one small piece over time, close up, then you report the types of things you are seeing (they tell you what to watch for) and run you through a virtual training so you know how to list different events. This helps them track the events up close.....um........the sun's pretty big and a lot of eyes watching different areas help them find things that they'd have missed if it was just a few scientists watching. It's really interesting - you should go check out the Stormwatch page.
    Signature

    Sal
    When the Roads and Paths end, learn to guide yourself through the wilderness
    Beyond the Path

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